PMQs: Frustration builds as May refuses to answer Corbyn’s questions on Brexit

Left Foot Forward

Four of Corbyn's six questions focused on Brexit — none were answered

Jeremy Corbyn has been criticised for not asking enough Brexit-based questions at PMQs, but today’s session demonstrates that whatever he asks, we still can’t expect any answers from the prime minister.

Four of the Labour leader’s six questions focused on the exiting process, in particular the role of the devolved adminstrations, the customs unions and the status of the Irish border. He repeatedly attacked May’s refusal to offer any details on her plans to the public, saying:

“Every day the PM dithers over this chaotic Brexit, employers delays investment and there are rumours about relocation. This cannot carry on until March next year. When will she come up with a plan?”

The Prime Minister offered her usual obfuscations in response, promising the ‘best possible arrangement’ and emphasising that ‘none of us want to see a return to the borders of the past’, but refusing to offer any detail on the process.

Later, she refused to engage with three separate questions on parity of esteem for mental health and brushed of a Northern Irish MPs question on the threat Brexit poses to the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement.

While many argue that Corbyn must do more to force answers — or at least highlight May’s mockery of the parliamentary process — frustration  with the prime minister is growing on the Labour benches.

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4 Responses to “PMQs: Frustration builds as May refuses to answer Corbyn’s questions on Brexit”

  1. Mick

    Sky News have a different take: http://news.sky.com/story/jeremy-corbyns-cunning-pmqs-plan-backfires-10632999

    Not that I’d want to embarrass the Left (Allah forbid!), itr’s just Sky News have more authority on issues like this They showed Emily Thornberry or Chuka Umunna to know very little themselves.

    And the Brexit Plan? May knows that keeping the Eurocrats and the Left in the dark, until more advanced plans come, is the wisest course. We know that behind closed doors, the business barons and Whitehall paladins have their own very sharp assurances and knowledge of ever-changing situations. In cases like this, secrecy is the edge. It’s just early days. We haven’t triggered Article 50 yet.

  2. ted francis

    Mick, with greatest respect, you are either a supreme optimist or more than a little naive. Of course Sky will give a positive slant: they are Murdoch’s mouthpiece, he’s the arch Eurosceptic and the Tories are his, bought and paid for. The truth is patently obvious: there is no Plan, they are frantically scrabbling around trying to formulate something that looks like a Plan. May is far from being the sharpest knife in the drawer but she is convinced that bullying is her best line of defence. She’ll learn that the Europeans won’t stand for it and the people of this country will suffer as a direct result of her and her cohorts’ mendacity.

  3. Mick

    “She’ll learn that the Europeans won’t stand for it….”

    You’re right there. They want to punish us. They’ve been clucking like a bunch of old hens, despite the fact they’re to blame for Brexit. They didn’t even give David Cameron the chickenfeed ‘reforms’ he wanted, which is very high handed. Given the EU’s high-cost, red tape-driven, stitch-up manic ways these last decades, they’re the last people to complain that we’ve upset their little picnic table.

    The EU’s in both financial and existential crisis. The Tory plan may well be to re-evaluate ideas on the hoof because our prospects become more hopeful every day.

  4. Mick

    “… she is convinced that bullying is her best line of defence.”

    No, that’s the EU. Junker said no Eurokrats must ever speak with ours about Brexit. And there’s talk all the time about sky high tariffs and our being made pariahs.

    Very insecure.

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